GRA wrote:The weird part as far as Norcal is that we had snow in the Lake Tahoe area just last Sunday, as well as high winds, some light rain, thunder and lightning, hail, a funnel cloud and below average temps in the Bay Area and Sacramento. While not unheard of, snow in June is extremely rare - even May is somewhat uncommon. Temps have been climbing steadily since then, and were in the normal range the past couple of days, but are forecast to break records in many places for the next week or so, with pretty much the entire Central Valley in triple digits a little early in the season.

Likely another example of one statistic being meaningless. In the time I have lived in Oly, the weather description has gone from "less than 5 days annually hitting 90º" to 6½ days on average. Now not saying this is a trend since anything in the 90's here is an outlier or extreme weather event (although it may not seen extreme to anyone else) so we could look at it like a big hurricane season or a small one but the trend seems to be extremely wetter more often and extremely hotter more often.

Yes, we have hit 100º in Oly like twice (none officially) in the first 120 years and a dozen time in the past 10 (including 4 times in 10 days...) but still nothing you can create a trend line on.

This is the whole issue with climate and weather. You need to consider the whole picture EVERYWHERE.

DaveinOlyWA wrote:Likely another example of one statistic being meaningless.

High temperatures over 90F is not a meaningless statistic for us. In fact, that is our *exact* criteria for when we turn on the A/C in our home. If the forecast is for the high temperature to be 90F or above, the A/C goes on. If it is below that point, it stays off. What that means for us is that we run our air conditioner for less than about one month in hot summers (like last year) compared to when we first got married when, we had about two-and-a-half times as many days over 90F during hot years. Lately, we have had quite a few years with only a handful of days above 90F.

DaveinOlyWA wrote:Colder Summers do not compensate for much warmer Winters.

That's an interesting comment from someone who just lived through the coldest winter in over 30 years. Thus the rapid wintertime cooling trend which began around the turn of the century in your part of the world continues, in spite of the previous two El-Nino-induced warm winters:

NSIDC wrote:The early maximum appears to be the result of an intense wind pattern in September, spanning nearly half of the continent from the Wilkes Land area to the Weddell Sea, and centered on the Amundsen Sea. Stronger than average low pressure in this area, coupled with high pressure near the Falkland Islands, and near the southern tip of New Zealand in the Pacific Ocean, created two regions of persistent northwesterly winds. Sea ice extent decreased in the areas where the northwesterly winds reached the ice front.

It seems that you, like WetEV, interpret a reduction in sea ice extent as all "melting". The science is pretty clear, the reduction in Antarctic sea ice extent last September was due to the ice being rapidly compressed into a smaller area due to winds.

NCAR wrote:The recent trend of increasing Antarctic sea ice extent — seemingly at odds with climate model projections — can largely be explained by a natural climate fluctuation, according to a new study led by the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR).

Sorry, guys, but the scientists are correct: natural processes still dominate the sea ice extent around Antarctica.